Covino, William A. and David A. Jolliffe. Rhetoric: Concepts, Definitions, Boundaries.
(1995)
What is Rhetoric?
“Not to persuade but to see the available means of persuasion in each case”—Aristotle (350 BCE)
“Two separate ideas—one an art, one a fraud”—Thomas DeQuincy 1828 “Rhetoric”
“Rhetorician—one voice in a dialogue. Several such voices acting upon each other in cooperative competition is dialectic that can lead to the views transcending the limitations of each” –Burke “Rhetoric old and New”
“The energy coded into the message—emotional energy that impels the speaker to speak, the physical energy expended in the utterance, the energy level coded in the message, and the energy experienced by the recipient in decoding the message” George Kennedy 1992
“Self admiring, self stimulating, self congratulatory phallocentrism” Helene Cixous 1975
Covino and Jollife say rhetoric is difficult to define BUT may be “the study and practice of shaping content”
When regarded as manipulation of linguistic features it becomes associated with fraud
Covino and Jolliffe “rhetoric is primarily verbal, situationally contingent, epistemic art that is both philosophical and practical and gives rise to potentially active texts.” (5)
Covino, William A. and David A. Jolliffe. Rhetoric: Concepts, Definitions, Boundaries.
(1995)